The 2026 Home Run Derby is scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. EDT Monday at Citizens Bank Park, but will Philadelphia’s weather cooperate, or could rain and other conditions affect baseball’s biggest power showcase?
The latest forecast not only answers the delay question, but also reveals which sluggers could benefit most from tonight’s conditions.
No rain is in the picture. Monday’s extreme heat watch pushed the daytime high to 84 degrees with a RealFeel near 97, according to AccuWeather’s hourly forecast for Citizens Bank Park, but that heat breaks fast once the sun starts to set, which occurs at 8:29 p.m. tonight in Philadelphia.
If there were to be a delay, it would be called due to extreme heat. But that danger subsides in the evening hours as well.
By first pitch at 8 p.m., the temperature drops to 78 degrees with a RealFeel of 76 and mostly sunny skies, according to the same hourly data. An hour earlier, at 7 p.m., readings sit at 80 degrees with light wind out of the south-southwest around 8 mph and just a 5 percent chance of precipitation.
Home Run Derby Weather Tonight at Citizens Bank Park
GettyBryce Harper #3 of the Philadelphia Phillies will take part in the Home Run Derby in front of his home crowd at Citizens Bank Park.
The cooldown continues through the night. AccuWeather projects 75 degrees at 9 p.m., 72 at 10 p.m. and 71 by 11 p.m., with skies turning from mostly clear to fully clear and rain chances sitting at zero percent for the entire window. Humidity climbs gradually as temperatures fall, from 63 percent at 9 p.m. to 71 percent by 11 p.m., but stays well short of the smothering levels that can deaden well-hit fly balls.
Wind holds remarkably steady across the event, running south-southwest between 6 and 8 mph with gusts topping out around 14 mph at 9 p.m. That’s a friendly, non-disruptive breeze at a ballpark already tied for as fifth-easiest in MLB for home run-hitting according to Statcast. Left-handed power, the kind Kyle Schwarber has built his career on, stands to benefit most from a tailwind with no gusts strong enough to scramble trajectories.
Fatigue, not physics, becomes the bigger variable across three rounds of all-out swinging. The Derby ditched its clock this year in favor of a swings-based format, with 20 cuts in the first round, 15 apiece in the semifinals and final. That means conditioning could separate contenders as cooling temperatures and rising evening humidity slowly shift the feel of the air late into the competition.
Derby Field and Odds: Who Weather Helps Most
GettyBen Rice #22 of the New York Yankees makes his Home Run Derby debut tonight.
Schwarber enters as the betting favorite at plus-330, according to FanDuel Sportsbook odds published by CBS Sports. The Phillies slugger leads all of baseball with 32 home runs at the All-Star break, and a home crowd plus a calm, dry evening can only aid his chances of success. Schwarber already owns a 460-foot blast this season, the second-longest in the field.
Junior Caminero, last year’s runner-up, sits next at plus-380 after a power surge that produced 11 homers over an 11-day stretch. Munetaka Murakami of the Chicago White Sox, who just returned from injury, follows at plus-500, with the St. Louis Cardinals’ Jordan Walker (plus-550), Phillies’ Bryce Harper (plus-650), Kansas City Royals’ Jac Caglianone (plus-750), New York Yankees’ Ben Rice (plus-950) and Boston Red Sox home run leader Willson Contreras (plus-2000) rounding out the field, according to the same odds board.
Harper, the 2018 champion, gets his first crack at the trophy as a Phillie in his home park. Zero percent rain chances and a steady breeze won’t erase the swing-mechanics gap between him and Schwarber, but they remove any excuse tied to the elements heading into a night his home crowd will be watching closely.
Murakami’s inclusion adds intrigue. His 99th-percentile hard-hit and barrel rates, according to ESPN, translate well to a launching pad with no crosswind working against him. Caglianone and Rice bring less established power numbers, while Contreras arrives as the the dark horse in the field.
This year’s bracketless, swings-based format trades the old countdown clock for fixed swing counts, shifting emphasis toward stamina over raw speed. With rain off the table and temperatures slipping from the mid-70s into the low 70s over the night, weather stops being a variable entirely, leaving the outcome to bat speed, timing and however hard the Citizens Bank Park crowd pushes its two hometown hitters.
The 2026 Home Run Derby streams live on Netflix starting at 8 p.m. EDT Monday, the online platform’s first year carrying the event exclusively. No traditional network or cable broadcast is scheduled to air the Derby, a shift from the event’s longtime home on ESPN.
GettyMunetaka Murakami #5 of the Chicago White Sox will look to impress in the Home Run Derby in Philadelphia.
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